Military Update

Hello all,

These last few months, Ikariam recieved some updates im really greatful for. Every one of them has been amazing! Keep up the good work!

Id like to know if there are plans for an update regarding the military aspect of the game and maybe start a discussion about what players would like to see.

The God’s shrine update has changed the game a lot. Dont get me wrong, Im really happy with the decision to implement it. However, I feel like it has also created some problems in terms of „big“ accounts / long time players (Account A) losing their advantage compared to newer / „small“ accounts (Account B).

Eventhough Account A can still hold more Military than Account B, battles are going to take longer and production of new units has been made easier for both, thanks to the increase in resource production, while unit costs have stayed the same.

This is especially going to be a problem, when Account B is just someone’s alt, built for the sole purpose of annoying someone else.

In the next update, Id like to see something along the lines of:

• Bigger battlefields in proportion to Town Hall level à faster battles.

Self explanatory. This is capped at TH lvl 24. Its long overdue. Accounts can hold too much military right now and battles last forever.

• Higher production costs for existing units à fixes one of the problems created by the God’s shrine.

• Maybe finally buff Steam Giants. This unit is useless. Too high resource costs, too much upkeep and not powerful enough compared to hoplites!

• Add further unit upgrades with requirements along your Ikariam journey. Not only Workshop level! Maybe add one extra upgrade per colony, starting at 12 towns. Or add different requirements... upgrade 4/4 available at town no. 13 planted and upgrade 5/5 available after 4/4 is reasearched + Barracks lvl 45+ / Shipyard lvl 38 in 10 towns, etc. These upgrades should also cost millions of resources and require higher upkeep ( or not, in case bigger battlefields are being implemented?)

I only consider this to be necessary, because once an account reaches a certain „level“, it only grows in Total score and way less in „power“ compared to newer accounts. Therefore, the power gap between accounts is getting smaller.

For example, comparing an account with one more „complete“ colony (TH lvl 40) to another, only results in a difference of ~5100 population -> ~30k gold/hour -> ~20k extra military? – at a cost of millions of resources and months of building time (under perfect conditions, full population, no temple, no academy, no production).

Sure, you could say that TH lvl 40 is far from a „complete“ colony, but during the building time alone necessary for further upgrades, an active smaller account would gain more power (population, through TH upgrades).

Thanks to the God’s shrine, new accounts can skip through low levels and reach a high enough „power level“ to challenge long time players pretty fast. At this point, its simply better to develop more accounts, than to keep upgrading your main account, in case of conflicts between players…

• Everyone’s beloved Blackmarket needs to change. Ive read plenty of good ideas about potential changes and id like to propose something based on the ideas I have already proposed under my previous points.

With more upgrade options for units/ships, the seller always sells military of their researched upgrades at a capped gold / resource amount per unit, proportional to upgrade levels.

Example: Account A has upgraded his units to 3/3, Account B to 5/5 and Account C to 7/7.

Account B sellls 5/5 units to Account A. Account A can either uses these 5/5 units in combat, or sells them to Account C. If Account C buys these units, he recieves 3/3 units, but can sell them further as 7/7, while only being able to use them as 3/3.

I know this requires a lot of time to write the code for, but i thought id give a suggestion aswell. Who knows, maybe Gameforge is interested.

These are just some quick thoughts Ive written down and im sure they probably arent the very best solutions for the future of the game. I am however certain, that a military update is necessary.

Feel free to share your thoughts and propose new ideas. I hope everyone understands, why I think „big“ accounts / long time players deserve an advantage over newer / smaller accounts.

- Aquila

Imo thats how it should be. You grow your account in order to hold larger armies and win battles more easily.

Its in the description of the game! – „Ikariam - Build, Conquer, Reign“

Why shouldnt a 1M account have a hard time against a 20M account? The 20M account probably required several years to get to that point, while a 1M account could most likely be built within less than a year, thanks to the Gods shrine.

The smaller player is only at a disadvantage if he provokes the bigger player himself. Ive rarely seen a big player „bully“ a small one for no reason. Even if thats the case, other players will most likely jump in to help.

As it is right now, i could build up one (or more…) new account(s) to 1-3M TS in about 1-1,5 years, hold ~50k Military thanks to the Gods shrine, continuously attack someone i pick at random and be able to rebuild my military just as fast as i lose it. Whats the point of growing that account further?

Usually the downside to holding military and waging war is the slower growth of the account. Why should slower growth bother me, if ive already reached the maximum available „power“?

On the other hand, "big" players require millions of ressources to grow their accounts further. It doesnt seem fair to me, that you should have a hard time protecting these ressources against accounts 1/10 your size.

Quote from Tendo

There are already many people who would claim that whoever has the bigger army, wins.

This change would basically straight up benefit the one with more army even more, while making it harder to maneuver with less Units.

For example, if the next battlefield size starts at TH 40, all players who reached that can already hold pretty massive armies. Im sure a lot of these players would like their battles to not take ages to end.

You could always decide to stop upgrading your TH once you reach lvl 39, at the cost of having less population than other players -> smaller army.

Quote from Tendo

Production costs aren't crazy agreed, but I don't see which problem exactly would be fixed by that?

The problem of ending a conflict. Right now, with double the production (Gods shrine) and even lower resource costs (new reducers lvl cap), players could effectively produce more wood + sulphur per day than they spend on new units.

Quote from Tendo

Many people would heavily disagree with this, especially those who fight a lot against Barbarians.

There are useless Units for sure like Archers or Ballistaships, balancing-updates definitely would be nice (but ofc. not an easy thing) and new Units.

My bad. I totally forgot about the barbarians, because I never bothered with them.

Quote from Tendo

Quote from -Aquila-

Why shouldnt a 1M account have a hard time against a 20M account? The 20M account probably required several years to get to that point, while a 1M account could most likely be built within less than a year, thanks to the Gods shrine.

Because it should not be about the account, but about the Player.

Right now Knowledge, Experience and Time are the deciding factors, which I clearly prefer.

If it's just about who has the technological Advantage / more Points, then why even bother fighting? You already know who wins.

Of course bigger Accounts already have a huge advantage, especially with such a difference like 1M vs 20M, but they have basically the same options.

I agree that bigger accounts should grow faster, for example the building-costs could have been kept at a maximum, or bigger TH-Levels should give more population and so on, but that's another topic.

Quote from -Aquila-

You could always decide to stop upgrading your TH once you reach lvl 39, at the cost of having less population than other players -> smaller army.

No you can't, if you upgraded it already to Level 40.

Quote from -Aquila-

The problem of ending a conflict. Right now, with double the production (Gods shrine) and even lower resource costs (new reducers lvl cap), players could effectively produce more wood + sulphur per day than they spend on new units.

That wouldn't change, whether you double or triple the costs and is imo. not the way to go to fix that.

Like Ika is just not made in a way which allows you to "defeat" an opponent.

Quote from JuneBarcarolle

I could also imagine Gameforge giving us some other use for all this extra gold the shrine allows us to generate.

As far as I can see everyone still heavily lacks Gold, especially because of Trading Ships / Freighters.

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I didn’t mean to lower the skill cap of the game with my proposition. Don’t get me wrong, the battle system is one of the reasons I still love this game. I would however like a goal, something to look forward to.

When 12 towns was the cap, you wanted to reach 12 towns in order to get 5/6 forges, 5 poseidons and 1-2 colossuses.

Now, you spend a few months of production and another few months of getting a new colony going, for what? Less colossus cooldown? Don’t really need that. Even more production? Meh.

All this while new accounts can reach 12 towns waaaay faster than you ever did + now you have to deal with 3M accounts running around with 70k MS holding battles for hours on end…

Nowadays, you no longer build to upgrade your account, but rather build to increase your TS.

I could rant forever about how time consuming the military aspect of the game has become. You would pillage someone a few times for 1/10 of the necessary resources for one upgrade and you would wake up the next day to 100k+ military at your door step. You fight it out for one week and the result is, he killed 10k of your military and you killed 15k of his military. Whats that? A difference of not even 100k resources? -- You might say this is a rare example, where both players are online all the time, but avoid eachother with every move, but you'd only have to take a look at CR threads in this forum and you'll see for yourself, how fighting at a "high level" looks like LOL.

Thinking about it again, I see 2 options:

1. make battlefields way bigger, or
2. make new units, that require a lot of upkeep -- This will however either make or break the game...

I’m sorry about new players, but I don’t think they‘re the audience Gameforge should make updates for.

Quote from AT Barbarossa

I would like at a certain point the player could manipulate the battlefield in this way:

After a certain town hall level/port -, when the battlefield is the same level of the over GL battlefield

1) The attacker can increase the capacity of its slots sending more units. For example if it have 2000 hoplites all togher its first line slots become 60 of capacity, if it have 3000 its first line slots become 70 and so on. NB: These numbers are only an example.

2) The owner of the city can invest resources and gold to "upgrade" the capacity of its slot. And this should apply both to the under GL and the over GL battlefield.

So… if a there are more units in a battle than allowed by the garrison limit, the attacker would be able to increase the battlefield size at will, by deploying more units? The defender on the other hand has to upgrade a new building, in order to match the battlefield size? Im not sure about that.

There’s a fine line we need to walk, when talking about an increase in battlefield size.

Usually, the defender wants smaller battlefields, while the attacker wants them to be bigger.

I think the „easiest“ solution, would be to double the current size of the battlefield once, starting at a TH 35-40. This should counter the x2 increase of gold production (God’s shrine + premium feature).

Capacity per round.

(old) Instead of the:

land

350 hops

240 sw

84 guns

30 mortars

60 gyros

30 balloons

sea

35 steam rams

36 rams

36 flames (waves)

42 mortars

30 rockets

6 carriers

30 speeds

(new) You would get:

land

700 hops

480 sw

168 guns

60 mortars

120 gyros

60 balloons

sea

70 steam rams

72 rams

72 flames (waves should?? stay the same but doubled? I dont know the math behind it.)

84 mortars

60 rockets

12 carriers

60 speeds

Maybe increase the battlefield size once again if necessary, after a few years of playing with it. Enough time for players to reach TH ~50+, to see if the battles start taking too long to finish again (more population -> too much military again -> battles too long)

AT Barbarossa -- I would like a new mechanic aswell, where garrison limit could play a meaningful role in combat, however, im not sure its doable, without altering the battle system too much.

As for an upgrade to the account… new units or upgrades are though. Maybe rework forms of government. Let them scale with the total level of Palace+GRs and add fitting bonuses.

It would be interesting, if you’d have a need to change your form of government, depending on what a situation calls for. I could imagine bonuses to:

Satisfaction

Upkeep and military speed

Building time

% increase of wonder effect

Corruption

Unskilled laborers + research points

Gold production and cargo + freighter speed

Quote from AT Barbarossa

According to me the bad points of the actual battle system are the following

0) defenders can stall attacckers with 13+more waves of 1 units/ 8+units ( respectively first and second line)

1) In naval combats aviations fakes ( 1 ram, 30 paddles, 5 ballons) are too advantageous for the attacker

2) In naval combacts a non-forge player has too disadvantage with respect of a forge player

3) Getting down high levels wall required too many time (even if sacrificing a lot of mortars)

4) The game in full of way to avoid combact

5) Defenders are the only one can change the GL

6) Cooperation in battles and in battle situations is not adeguately rewarder.

7) Colossus

The problems of battles going on forever is not a problem of this update. This under spoiler is a battle of 2013 lasted quite a month and finished because of Christmas. It took place in a Italian server surely not one of the most developer one .

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(23.12.2013 2:10:50)

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Bulwai da Candoglia, ლOrkney, burgabass, hello, LORDS COLOSSIUM, callisto da Candoglia, hello, ლOrkney, LORDS COLOSSIUM, ஐOlimpiaஐ, ஞBooஞ, லO-3ல, enzonadya da , South Park da Candoglia, ლOrkney, LORDS COLOSSIUM, ẅCronoẅ, RIP, hello, burgabass, MicroMarmo, max67 da Polis, ლOrkney, 中Carthago中, TRI da LORDS COLOSSIUM, Mag Tuired, _heaven_ da Candoglia, burgabass, tessorro, Carrara, Efesto 6, Malekith72 da Polis, LORDS COLOSSIUM, braveheart da Candoglia, Carrara, ლOrkney, laura da , topo72 da Carrara, ლOrkney, topa marmo, don_planet da Carrara, The Joker da ლOrkney, Litos da , ik77 da ல Odulus 01 ல, Ψ Odulus 04 Ψ, փ Odulus 09 փ, ლOrkney, LORDS COLOSSIUM, Blenders da ლOrkney, Ommariuolo da Villa Mariuola, Sol fa re, the animal da Carrara, burgabass, tessorro, ல Triple H, Il Prof da , YPSY da XABARAS, ლOrkney, Polifemo da ლOrkney, RIP, Fiammetta 4, LORDS COLOSSIUM, hello, Since1982 da ლOrkney



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Nave con Ariete.................29130(-38664) - Nave con Ariete.................34429(-35377)

Nave lanciafiamme...............12674(-70503) - Nave lanciafiamme................7195(-76681)

Nave con Mortaio...................26530(-32) - Nave con Mortaio...................28407(-80)

Sottomarino......................11877(-4659) - Sottomarino......................10889(-6152)

Ariete con ruote a pale.............30273(-6) - Ariete con ruote a pale...........32936(-108)

Portapalloni......................4397(-4054) - Portapalloni......................4606(-4004)

Nave appoggio........................1302(-0) - Nave appoggio........................2563(-0)

Nave con Catapulta..................7822(-12) - Nave con Catapulta...................5767(-0)

Ariete a vapore..................19268(-4702) - Ariete a vapore..................20752(-3541)

Nave lanciamissili................1542(-1270) - Nave lanciamissili..................219(-797)

Nave con Balestra.....................672(-0) - .............................................

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Generali............................-987302.4 - Generali............................-998472.8

Punti d`attacco.......................2496182 - Punti difesa..........................2468256

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Vincitori: LORDS ATTILA, Davide2, aragon64, ANGELO68, vacanziero, Shanks Il Rosso, Fattone93, Andrea, msa, ronni, leonida74, SAD-Hector, Hagen, Rufysan, andrew92gela, Er_vandalo, skyfus, EL_MACHICO, Inc-domenic68



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Things where changed and now i see there is no more cooperations in battles. There can still be cooperation in alliances via black markets but there are only 1-2-3 player actively moving and fighting, with banks and general bank in support.

Since the game is old, players do not satisfy only fighting, but winning.

If there would be any change to the battle system it can go in 2 directions: increase the disequilibrium of battles, giving a player more options to win easier and faster, or give more balance: being off while fighting should not be the end of the world, but the defender that wakes up can not wipe you out with a single click (colossus).

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And then there is the 3rd directions: introduce several bugs players can swim into

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Very well said!! Players desire to win, not just fight an endless stalemate!

One of the problems ive seen too often is catching someone forged, but offline. You would wave correctly for a few hours and get colossused once the opponent logs in. The end CR looks something like 7k generals lost on your side to 12k generals lost on their side, after many rounds of active participation. The 5k generals difference is nothing, compared to the resource production accounts can achieve nowadays. Activity isnt rewarded properly!

This is especially more annoying, when your opponent is 1/10 your size.

Players usually look at the difference in generals at the end of a battle, to determine who won. Make this difference bigger ! Reward players for playing the battle system correctly! Right now, the winner of a battle is the player who spends the least amount of time on the game!

Quote from GambleUS

I'd like to see Doctors and Cooks /Tenders have bigger roles in battle. If cooks/enders could have a slot and be killed separately that would be interesting.

Doctors being able to heal units or buff units in battle would be nice as well.

Making Morale its own battle in itself would be cool.

Maybe the introduction of more random elements. I liked Crusader Kings 2 concept of battle where you had a leader of the military and their traits affected how they maneuvered in war. If this was a new unit "Flank Commander, Infantry Specialist, Logistics Specialist" or something like that and it gave a boost to Flanks, Hoplites, Morale in battles that would be interesting too.

For Instance, Spearman could become more interesting if you had say "King of Pikes" or something that gave increased durability and strength to the Spearman (because in-game lore, the Leader can teach these civilians how to make a proper line of spears against enemies).

Terrain and weather also could affect war. If you're on wine islands, maybe the land is more mushy and grassy (slower times for battle). Maybe its more explosive and dangerous on sulfur islands (Random deaths of units on each side due to explosions) and more mountainous on Marble (Harder to attack the defender due to the terrain of their city being on stone mountains)

All depends what the coding and script will allow.

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Its always fun to think about what new mechanics could be added to the game, to make the battle system even more fun and complex than it is right now. I do however think, that changing the battle system drastically after so many years, isnt the right way to go about it.

Imo, the change should be in terms of scaling battles to the new size and production of accounts + add a way for accounts to progress, other than just in terms of total score.

Quote from AT Barbarossa

Quote from -Aquila-

One of the problems ive seen too often is catching someone forged, but offline. You would wave correctly for a few hours and get colossused once the opponent logs in. The end CR looks something like 7k generals lost on your side to 12k generals lost on their side, after many rounds of active participation. The 5k generals difference is nothing, compared to the resource production accounts can achieve nowadays. Activity isnt rewarded properly!

If you are in the very lucky situation with an offline opponent for some hours you can go for aviations fake and attack it only when its aviations and artillery is completely absent.

If you have so many unit to continue fake you can destroy even opponents second line.

Example:

This battle wasn't perfectly waved.

Two players on offense (online) VS. one player on defense (offline)

Battle duration: ~4 hours

In order to kill the remaining 1333 rocket ships with aviation fakes / sniper attacks, you would need:

1333 / 4 = 333,25 = 334 rounds

-> 334 x 6 = 2004 carriers

334x 30 = 10020 speedboats

334 action points

Is this an enjoyable battle? Generals will only get bigger in time.

Edit: For some reason, uploading images seems to be bugging out.

Quote from AT Barbarossa

Quote from -Aquila-

In order to kill the remaining 1333 rocket ships with aviation fakes / sniper attacks, you would need:

1333 / 4 = 333,25 = 334 rounds

-> 334 x 6 = 2004 carriers

334x 30 = 10020 speedboats

334 action points

To be precise you need only

5 x 334 carriers = 1670 and

29 x 334 speedboats = 9686

Two big acconts can easly reach this numers, then the only remaining problem could be action points.

Quote from -Aquila-

Is this an enjoyable battle? Generals will only get bigger in time.

Maybe not, but a 2 round battle with small army is an enjoyable battle ?

If the answer is yes you can register and play in new servers each time it opens.

Battles are not the scope of the game. They are a mean to reach something else, usually an economic advantage, both with gap or with pillages or with hades miraculous.

I am not saying there should not be an upgrade. I also would like to see a military upgrade, but I think a military update could be the a chance to make the battle system more balanced and fix at least some of that bad points I already mentioned, while I am worried about it will only be "increase the slot capacity and bye bye"

Anyway, to solve the "problem" without affecting the battle system the could increase units costs, expecially in terms of gold maintenance, and maybe decrease the round duration from 15 min to 10 min

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Looking at your points again, an increase in battlefield size would fix most of them.

Except maybe for:

1) - build more rockets / carriers / paddles and hide your military better

2) - not a game problem, get 6 forges and have your forge active 24/7

7) - only fix i can think of is to have a 3D cooldown on colossus, no matter how many colonies / temples you have with that wonder.

I dont know, whether Gameforge is allocating enough game developers to ikariam, in order to rework the battle system and make it more "fair" / balanced. Honestly, id be happy with just about any update. Just hoping someone is working on something, or at least reading through some of the threads here, to know what the "problems" are.